Dancers in the Snow
by Sternenlicht
Summary: A beautiful morning after a beautiful night. Christian reminds Satine of something that she forgot a long time ago...


A/N: I haven't written any stories in what seems like ages, but I recently watched Moulin Rouge and I just _had_ to write this little piece. It's just a short introspective story about Satine and a morning after a beautiful night….

Disclaimer: I don't own anyone, although I'd _love_ to have Christian….

_Dancers in the Snow_

Two tiny figures in the snow.

Dancing, holding each other.

Laughing.

A world that solely belonged to them.

Nothing to disrupt their peace.

No one to disturb them.

A tiny girl, dressed in a dancer's skirt, with long hair adorning her head.

A tiny boy, dressed in a black tuxedo, snow gathering in his hair.

Music swirling around them, prompting them to move.

Perfect movement, ever in tune.

Snowfall gradually lessening, last artificial flakes settling.

A quiet, sad smile. She so badly wanted to shake the snow dome again, reawakening the tiny boy, the little girl in their perfect world. Where there was no sorrow, no pain, no death. Either dancing or standing still, but never alone.

Soon she would be alone.

Her boy would be gone, and there would be no more dancing in a not so perfect world.

They had danced the night before when everything had seemed so far away and no one had reminded them of their harsh reality where she was a courtesan and he a penniless writer, who could not be together.

He had held her even closer than the boy held his girl in her snow dome, which remained on a dusty windowsill in her home, forgotten long ago and remembered only now, on this cold December morning. They had swayed to a music that only they could hear, and they had laughed for reasons no one could understand but them. They had kissed, and for moments their not so perfect world had become perfect.

Her boy. Who did not really resemble the dancer in her snow dome, and who was not really a boy, but a man. And yet she wished for him to be that tiny figure in the snow, for that would mean that she was the little girl in the skirt who knew nothing about courtesans, and feigned feelings, and love that was not real.

The quiet, sad smile again.

For a night, she knew now, she had become the tiny dancer in the arms of her boy. Someone who really loved and laughed and did not feign. Every kiss had been meant because her heart had told her to kiss her boy, with his black hair and his blue eyes. Who had come and melted the wall within her, and had done so without really intending to.

He had sung to her that first night, and though she had not yet realized it then, he had reminded her of the dancer of her childhood, because he had given her the opportunity to glimpse that perfect world again, which she had believed to be lost in the streets and behind the curtains and behind the doors that led to rooms with large beds in them.

Rooms like the one she would have to return to. Soon. And again she would forget her snow dome, until her boy reminded her once more. The boy who was a man, and a penniless writer, and who had the bluest eyes she had ever seen. The boy who had said that he loved her, and who was the first one to have ever meant it.

The boy on whose chest she was now lying, and whose skin was warm underneath her cheek. Whose breathing she could feel, and whose heart was beating beneath her ear. The boy who had not attempted to seduce her, but had been content to hold her, to kiss her, to laugh with her. With whom she had danced until the moon had completed his journey across the nightly sky, and who had held her so effortlessly against himself that she had almost started to believe in a perfect world again.

His lips and his eyes, and his cheeks and his nose and his mouth. His smile.

Everything about him held the promise of a better world, and she knew that with him she could be the tiny girl in her snow dome on a dusty windowsill in a forgotten home. With him she would not feel the cold. The snow would merely be a blanket that protected them, and in time covered all the ugly things that were not meant to be.

His warmth would save her. It was saving her even now, staving off the chill she usually felt on cold December mornings. His embrace was enough to make her not so perfect world a little more perfect, and the snow a little less cold.

And yet he would be gone soon. Why should her boy remain with her when she was a courtesan who had slept with so many men as to have forgotten their faces? Whose names she had never known and had never wanted to know?

He, who was meant to achieve so much, to live in a perfect world? Be a dancer, not bound by a little girl in a skirt. A girl who would always remember his name, for it was special and would forever hold the promise that being a courtesan was not everything.

The night before had been everything, and this morning was everything, and the boy beneath her was everything. His lashes, just barely grazing his cheeks, were everything. The fine mole, just above his lips, was everything.

And everything she wanted was him to wake up, and kiss her, and tell her that he loved her.

And she wanted to be caressed, and embraced, and discovered. And she herself wanted to caress, to embrace, and to discover. She wanted to feel.

But he was sleeping peacefully, and she marveled about how it was even possible for her to want him. Until last night only unknown, forgotten faces had lain next to her, and never had she wanted them. She had come to endure them and had enjoyed the nights she had been left alone. Yet now she was longing for his touch, and with awe she discovered that she wanted him. A yearning she had never felt before, and fleetingly she wondered if that made her world less perfect again.

But could she believe – or even imagine – that she could leave him now? Only for the sake of losing that feeling of _feeling_ again? For the sake of once more dying inside?

Lying atop his warm chest, listening to his slow breathing, she realized that she simply could not. Rather, she knew, she would give up everything else that had once mattered. The shows, the admiration, the glamour. Their significance dwindled when compared to the light her boy had brought with him. He had shattered her imperfect world, and had invaded her thoughts and her dreams.

And even if she lost him that very morning, even if there had been only that single night so full of laughter and love and feeling alive, there would be no return to her former life of being the Sparkling Diamond.Too many changes had occurred, had happened within the few hours the moon needed to only once cross the sky.

She loved him, she could now admit to herself. And rather she would have this one day with him than all days without him. Because without him, this cold morning would have been imperfect. As imperfect as all days before and after, as long as she lived.

But now it was not. For he was her dancer, and so she was the little girl, and so their world was perfect.

A perfect, cold December morning. With his warm skin beneath her cheek, his warm breath ghosting over the tips of her hair, and his warm hands on her back, holding her close.

And when he opened his eyes, they shone with a bright light that drove away even the last tiniest remnant of winter and coldness.

"I love you," he whispered, and she knew he meant it, for she felt like dancing as she had done when she had still been a little girl, and her world had still been perfect.

As it was now, as her boy loved her, and she loved him, and together they could dance in the snow without feeling cold and lonely, and without fearing someone might shatter their perfect world.

A/N: Please leave an review, I beg you! g


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